Meon Valley Stud A True Black And White Classic

It remains one of the great text book examples of how to set up a successful broodmare band. The story has been told but is worth repeating as twilight settles on a season which has reaped a number of decent victories and, crucially for Meon Valley Stud, a homebred Oaks winner.

A casual suggestion by Elizabeth Weinfeld that her husband Egon should “buy himself a racehorse” to occupy the hours previously spent supporting their children Mark and Helena during their time showjumping led to one of the most respected Thoroughbred breeding operations in Britain.

The studiously retentive mind of Weinfeld senior coupled with the skill of bloodstock agent Richard Galpin led to the purchase of three yearling fillies in 1977, followed by another the following year. Favouring female lines with a dash of speed over fashionable stallions, Galpin's selection of the fillies who would go on to be named Reprocolor (GB) (Jimmy Reppin {GB}), One In A Million (Ire) (Rarity {GB}), Odeon (Ire) (Royal And Regal) and Home And Away (GB) (Home Guard) stands as testament to his good judgement to this day. Moreover, it is a great credit to the Weinfeld family's excellent management of the farm set on Hampshire's chalk downland that, 40 years after One In A Million became the first Classic winner in the now-familiar black-and-white spotted colours, her great-great grand-daughter Anapurna (GB) (Frankel {GB}) should deliver a coveted victory in the Oaks. On Saturday, she collected a second Group 1 victory in the Qatar Prix de Royallieu.

“Our father started this more as a hobby really when we stopped show jumping. He used to come and drive the box and help put the studs in,” recalls Meon Valley Stud's managing partner Mark Weinfeld of the farm's founder, who died in 2013.

Weinfeld's sister Helena Ellingsen adds, “Every single weekend we were at a horse show—parents, dogs, whatever. Mark gave up first and then I did and I think my parents started to wonder what they were going to do with themselves because it's such a way of life. My mother said to my father, 'you always liked racing why don't you buy yourself a racehorse?' She suggested one horse and he bought three.”

Three quickly became four but if that seemed extravagant at the time, the fillies very soon repaid their new owner. One In A Million's victory in the 1000 Guineas would have been just reward in itself, but she also claimed the Coronation S. on the disqualification of Buz Kashi (GB), while Reprocolor won the Lingfield Oaks Trial and the Lancashire Oaks, and Odeon won the Galtres S. and was runner-up in both the Fillies' Mile and the Nassau S. Home And Away was the only one of the quartet never to race.

Weinfeld says, “At the time I think we just thought that this was how it is, and it's only when you look back at it afterwards, after a few lean years, that you think, heck, how did that happen?' But Dad put in plenty of research and did lots of reading. When he went to the sales with Richard Galpin he had done a lot of homework and he had a very good memory from all his days of following the racing, so he was familiar with a lot of the bloodlines. And I think he did have a good eye for a horse.”

Ellingsen adds, “Henry Cecil didn't even want to take One In A Million. He liked Odeon but he thought One In A Million was too small and my father said, 'well it's two or nothing'. And she went in and there was a phone call saying, 'I don't think you have to worry about that little one'. We didn't realise how lucky we were, our parents winning the Guineas. I can remember them saying after the race that we mustn't hang around as we had to get back to feed the dogs.”

As broodmares, all four have made a contribution to the ever-growing stakes roll of honour of Meon Valley Stud but it is the two least expensive yearling purchases, Reprocolor (25,000gns) and One In A Million (18,500gns), whose impact as broodmares has been the most significant. Indeed, at Epsom's Investec Derby meeting this year they were responsible for providing the Weinfelds with a runner in each Classic: the G2 Dante S. winner Telecaster (GB) (New Approach {Ire}), a sixth generation descendant of Reprocolor, ran in the Derby for Castle Down Racing, a group of family and friends of the stud, the day after Anapurna had won the Oaks.

“It was unbelievable. It was a week of completely living on nerves,” says Weinfeld. “But in a strange way because of all the hype over Telecaster we almost forgot about Anapurna, so in a way the win was unexpected. We'd been placed in the Oaks before and when Pink Dogwood came up we thought to ourselves 'oh well, third again', but she fought back and it was almost unbelievable when she crossed the line. What an amazing weekend. It's what we live for really, and to have had one in each Classic from a broodmare band of only 35, from a full crop that year of 24, it was very special.”

In the ensuing 40 years since the stud's inception, only two fillies from other lines have ever been bought—Kinetix (Fr) (Linamix {Fr}) and Italian Connection (GB) (Cadeaux Genereux {GB}), whose half-sister Ever Rigg (GB) (Dubai Destination) later produced Postponed (Ire) (Dubawi {Ire}). Naturally, however, to keep the numbers in check, the majority of the youngsters bred at Meon Valley must go to the sales each year. In four of the last five years, Meon Valley has been in the top ten consignors of Book 1, as well as providing the co-top lot—Emaraaty (GB), a son of Dubawi and Reprocolor's grand-daughter Zee Zee Top (GB) (Zafonic)—at 2.6 million gns in 2016.

For all this commercial success, there have been plenty who failed to find a buyer at the sales but have gone on to be black-type performers—not least Telecaster and his dam Shirocco Star (GB) (Shirocco {Ger}), as well as dual Group 1 winner Speedy Boarding (GB) (Shamardal) and her dam Dash To The Front (GB) (Diktat {GB}).

Speedy Boarding, by a stallion whose star is ever-rising, both as a sire and damsire, is represented on the opening day of Book 1 of the Tattersalls October Sale via her first foal (lot 44), a colt by Dubawi. Furthermore, the mare's three-parts-brother, a powerful chestnut colt strongly reminiscent of his sire Lope De Vega (Ire), sells the following day as lot 243.

The strong female family links continue with the appearance of yearlings in Book 1 out of Zee Zee Top (a Siyouni (Fr) colt, lot 130) and two of her daughters Izzi Top (GB) (Pivotal {GB}) and Jazzi Top (GB) (Danehill Dancer {Ire}), whose colts by Frankel and Pivotal appear as lots 356 and 363 respectively.

Following one withdrawal, 12 Meon Valley Stud yearlings will be offered in Book 1, four tracing to One In A Million and eight to Reprocolor, though there are no siblings to Telecaster or Anapurna this year. The latter's dam Dash To The Top has not gone in foal since delivering her Classic-winning daughter, but it is hoped that she will return to Frankel, to whom Shirocco Star is now in foal. Shirocco Star's current juvenile by Dubawi, Al Suhail (GB), is a winner and Group 3-placed this year for Godolphin, having been sold for 1.1 million gns last year.

For an increasing number of participants in the bloodstock industry, the involvement ends with the sales ring, but Mark Weinfeld has managed to strike a successful balance between the commercial and the owner-breeder elements of the operation.

He says of the sales, “It's a different kind of achievement and it pays the bills. For several years the stud lost money so you do need to have those good years and the sales are very important. There have been years when horses have gone up and we thought we had some lovely individuals and they haven't sold. The business has to stand on its own feet and unlike any other business, 90% of our turnover comes from the three days of Book 1.”

There is a long list of Meon Valley-bred horses to have raced successfully for other owners, including another Oaks winner Lady Carla (GB) (Caerleon), Kayf Tara (GB) (Sadler's Wells) and his full-brother Opera House (GB), San Sebastian (GB) (Niniski {GB}), Caspar Netscher (GB) (Dutch Art {GB}), and this season's Royal Ascot winner Dashing Willoughby (GB) (Nathaniel {Ire}). However, the selective nature of the sales ring means that no consignor can approach the season with total confidence.

Weinfeld continues, “The market has become very polarised and there are only a few people right at the very top for the Dubawis, and horses like that, and then there are gaps underneath that. We wouldn't put a horse in Book 1 if we didn't feel he or she was a really nice individual. We're generally in Book 1 or Book 3. It's very difficult for us to get a horse into Book 2, though we have two in it this year. The colts go to be sold, as well as some of the fillies in an attempt to keep the numbers down, but with a horse like Telecaster, if there was no one there to buy him, we couldn't just let him go for nothing.”

Weinfeld admits to having a soft spot for the Oaks-placed Shirocco Star and it's clear that both he and his sister are very fond of her son Telecaster, who is currently back at Meon Valley Stud for a break ahead of a 4-year-old campaign. Anapurna, however, will return to the farm at the end of this season to take her place alongside her mother in the broodmare band.

“It really is special to us to have this home-grown element to the horses,” says Ellingsen. “Everything we have has been bred on the farm here from generations back. We know exactly where they have come from and how they have been reared.”

Meon Valley Stud's understated marketing has for a long time quietly carried the slogan 'Cradle of the Classic Thoroughbred'. Over four decades its graduates have ensured that on many occasions it has been an operation worthy of such a claim, often spelling it out quite clearly in black and white.